Nessus posted:

I thought, well, there's going to be a huge abundance of stored data, indeed a violent surfeit of it, but there is the question of how much of this is going to be archived in a reliable and accessible way. The gripping hand to this is that I think people may underestimate how easy it will be to store things like codecs and old operating systems.

skasion posted:

The Historia Augusta isn’t always boring, but some of it is. The stuff right before that (life of Severus Alexander) is this incredibly tedious and probably half bullshit exploration of the concept of the philosopher-king. Then you have a bit later on about a made-up emperor who ate ostriches.

Historia Augusta posted:

2 1 For you know, my dear Bassus,5 how great an argument we had but recently with Marcus Fonteius,6 that lover of history, when he asserted that Firmus, who had seized Egypt in the time of Aurelian, was not an emperor but merely a brigand, while I, and together with me Rufius Celsus and Ceionius Julianus and Fabius Sossianus, argued against him, maintaining that Firmus had both worn the purple and called himself Augustus on the coins that he struck, and Archontius Severus even brought out certain coins of his and proved, moreover, from Greek and Egyptian books that in his edicts he had called himself emperor. 2 Fonteius, on the other hand, in his contention against us, had only the argument that Aurelian wrote in one of his edicts, not that he had slain a pretender, but that he had rid the state of a brigand — just as though a prince of such renown could properly have called so obscure a fellow by the name of pretender, or as though mighty emperors did not always use the term of brigand in speaking of those whom they slew when attempting to seize the purple! 3 I myself, indeed, in my Life of Aurelian,7 before I learned the whole story of Firmus, thought of him, p391 not as one who had worn the purple, but only as a sort of brigand; and this I have stated here that no one may think that I am inconsistent. 4 Lest I add too much, however, to a book which I promised to make very short, we shall now proceed to Firmus.

3 1 Now Firmus8 was a native of Seleucia,9 though many of the Greeks write otherwise, not knowing that at that same time there were three men called Firmus, one of them prefect of Egypt, another commander of the African frontier and also proconsul,10 and the third this friend and ally of Zenobia's, who, incited by the madness of the Egyptians, seized Alexandria and was crushed by Aurelian with the good fortune that was wont to attend his valour.

2 Concerning the wealth of this last-named Firmus much is related. For example, it is said that he fitted his house with square panes of glass set in with pitch and other such substances and that he owned so many books that he used often to say in public that he could support an army on the paper and glue. 3 He kept up, moreover, the closest relations with the Blemmyae11 and Saracens, and he often sent merchant-vessels to the Indians also.a 4 He even owned, it is said, two elephant-tusks, •ten feet in length, to which Aurelian planned to add two more and make of them a throne on which he would place a statue of Jupiter, made of gold and decked with jewels and clad in a sort of bordered p393 toga, to be set up in the Temple of the Sun;12 and, after asking advice of the oracle in the Apennines,13 he purposed to call him Jupiter the Consul or the Consulting. 5 These tusks, however, were later presented by Carinus to a certain woman, who is said to have made them into a couch; her name, both because it is known now and because future generations will have no profit from knowing it, I will leave unmentioned. 6 So under a most evil prince the gift of the Indians, consecrated to Jupiter Best and Greatest, seems to have become both the instrument and the reward of lust.

4 1 But as for Firmus himself, he was of huge size, his eyes very prominent, his hair curly, his brow scarred, his face rather swarthy, while the rest of his body was white, though rough and covered with hair, so that many called him a Cyclops. 2 He would eat great amounts of meat and he even, so it is said, consumed an ostrich in a single day. He drank little wine but very much water. He was most resolute in spirit, and in sinews most strong, so that he surpassed even Tritannus,14 of whom Varro makes mention. 3 For he would hold out resolutely when an anvil was placed on his chest and men struck it, while he, leaning backward face up, supporting his weight on his hands, seemed to be suspended rather than to be lying down.b In drinking, moreover, he would compete with Aurelian's generals whenever they wished to test him. 4 For example, when a certain fellow named Burburus, one of the standard-bearers and a notable drinker, challenged him to a contest in drinking, he drained two buckets full of p395 wine and yet remained sober throughout the whole banquet; and when Burburus asked, "Why did you not drink up the dregs?" he replied, "You fool, one does not drink earth." But we are narrating mere trifles when we should be telling what is of greater importance.

5 1 He, then, seized the imperial power in opposition to Aurelian with the purpose of defending the remainder of Zenobia's party. Aurelian, however, returning from Thrace defeated him. 2 Many relate that he put an end to his life by strangling, but Aurelian himself in his proclamations says otherwise; for when he had conquered him he gave orders to issue the following proclamation in Rome:

3 "From Aurelian Augustus to his most devoted Roman people, greeting. We have established peace everywhere throughout the whole world in its widest extent, and also Firmus, that brigand in Egypt, who rose in revolt with barbarians and gathered together the remaining adherents of a shameless woman — not to speak at too great length — we have routed and seized and tortured and slain. 4 There is nothing now, fellow-citizens, sons of Romulus, which you need fear. The grain-supply from Egypt, which has been interrupted by that evil brigand, will now arrive undiminished. 5 Do you only maintain harmony with the senate, friendship with the equestrian order, and good will toward the praetorian guard. I will see to it that there is no anxiety in Rome. Do you devote your leisure to games and to races in the circus. 6 Let me be concerned with the needs of the state, and do you busy yourselves with your pleasures. Wherefore, most revered fellow-citizens," and so forth.

6 1 This is what you should know that we have p397 found out concerning Firmus, all, however, that is worthy of mention. 2 For as to what Aurelius Festivus,15 Aurelian's freedman, has reported about him in detail, if you wish to learn it, you should read him yourself, most of all the passage which tells how this same Firmus went swimming among the crocodiles when rubbed with crocodiles' fat, how he drove an elephant and mounted a hippopotamus and rode about sitting upon huge ostriches, so that he seemed to be flying. 3 But what avails it to know all this, especially as both Livy and Sallust are silent in regard to trivial matters concerning those men on whose biographies they have laid hold? 4 For instance, we do not know of what breed were the mules of Clodius16 or the she-mules of Titus Annius Milo, or whether the horse that Catiline rode was a Tuscan or a Sardinian, or what kind of purple Pompey used for his cloak. 5 Therefore we will make an end of Firmus and pass on to Saturninus, who seized the imperial power in the regions of the East in opposition to Probus.

Ynglaur posted:

One of the universities in my area has an interesting problem maintaining old computer models. For example, some PhD student creates a really useful model for, I dunno, some fish population in the Western Mediterranean. Fishing companies and scientists still use it umpteen years later because it turns out to be pretty accurate, but nobody knows how it works because the documentation is long since lost and the code was written in some obscure language and is running on hardware that wasn't even modern a generation ago.

Jazerus posted:

no, the romans did not understand macroeconomics at all. nobody did for over a thousand years after them, either. it's not really something you can reason about without either a very large number of historical examples of "king so-and-so did this, and then this happened", or statistics. both played a part in the establishment of economics as a discipline, and to this day it's one of the shakiest fields of academic study. roman medicine, on the other hand, actually kicked a lot of rear end. trust me, you'd rather be treated by a roman doctor than anyone else if you have to pick a pre-1900 doctor.

cheetah7071 posted:

drat this author seems like a wild ride. Passive aggressively badmouthing famous historians, recounting his arguments with his colleagues, and petulantly refusing to name people who he really doesn't like

Do any other historians mention the woman who he refuses to name?

Grand Fromage posted:

Medicine depends on what exactly was wrong. As far as injuries go, Roman doctors had a ton of experience and knowledge, as well as a reasonably good understanding of the body that wasn't surpassed until the Renaissance. Their tools were essentially identical to a surgical kit today, we have some solid explanations of techniques that make sense, and there's evidence from bodies of some pretty gnarly surgeries that the people survived.

As far as disease goes, nobody really knew poo poo prior to the discovery of germs. Roman doctors did understand infection to an extent though, they had no theoretical model but had observed things like cleaning your medical instruments and using hot wine on wounds would reduce the chance of infection, and they knew of medical plants. I wouldn't say the Roman ability to treat disease was special though, it's more about what they could do with surgery and injury care.

Grand Fromage posted:

The revisionist Nero view is fairly popular these days. He was definitely not a good emperor. The ones who gained power as teenagers almost always were not good, shockingly enough. But he wasn't terrible either. His reputation was tarnished by actions that pissed off the elite class and persecuting Christians. Even a few historians of the era mentioned that elites loved to slander Nero for no real reason, and he was popular enough among the people that multiple pretenders to the throne claiming to be Nero showed up, which was not a common thing.

Angry Salami posted:

Trump being attacked by a bald eagle named Uncle Sam was clearly a metaphor, and you'd have to be a complete idiot to take it literally!

Dalael posted:

Sounds to me like the only young guy to get power and not abuse it was Scipio. Everyone else turned abusers/murderers as soon as they could....

Maybe Alexander Severus too?

Starpluck posted:

Are there any references to the reign of Tutankhamun that discusses issues other than the treasures in his tomb? I am looking for an informative resource regarding this Pharaoh and I can't find anything.

Grand Fromage posted:

Medicine depends on what exactly was wrong. As far as injuries go, Roman doctors had a ton of experience and knowledge, as well as a reasonably good understanding of the body that wasn't surpassed until the Renaissance. Their tools were essentially identical to a surgical kit today, we have some solid explanations of techniques that make sense, and there's evidence from bodies of some pretty gnarly surgeries that the people survived.

As far as disease goes, nobody really knew poo poo prior to the discovery of germs. Roman doctors did understand infection to an extent though, they had no theoretical model but had observed things like cleaning your medical instruments and using hot wine on wounds would reduce the chance of infection, and they knew of medical plants. I wouldn't say the Roman ability to treat disease was special though, it's more about what they could do with surgery and injury care.

Nebakenezzer posted:

Impressive! I really wish the importance of hygiene in surgery had made it out of the Roman period.

Starpluck posted:

Are there any references to the reign of Tutankhamun that discusses issues other than the treasures in his tomb? I am looking for an informative resource regarding this Pharaoh and I can't find anything.

Koramei posted:

I thought one of the whole things about the treasures was that he was an utterly unimportant Pharaoh that did nothing of note and yet even he gets buried with so much cool poo poo

Grand Fromage posted:

My understanding is also that Tut was an irrelevant figure and only famous because his tomb was intact. The traditional religion was restored under him to erase the whole Akhenaten incident, but that would've happened no matter who it was. I'm not aware of anything else of importance that happened during his reign.

euphronius posted:

King tut recently covered by in our time


https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/m000cng6

Starpluck posted:

Do you think he may have asked for a smaller tomb? That would indicate he was a good King.

euphronius posted:

King tut recently covered by in our time

Grand Fromage posted:

They could also do poo poo you would not imagine working. We have skulls of people who had successful brain surgery and there's writing about cataract surgeries, though no way to verify those since there's no bone evidence. If you want to survive getting stabbed by a big ol sword anywhere in the premodern world, you probably want a Roman doctor.

That said of course, all medicine before the understanding of germs and antiseptics was best avoided.

Grand Fromage posted:

No, it really looks like he died unexpectedly young and they just threw together what they had for the tomb.

Starpluck posted:

Then just ban me and let this small post be my tomb.

chitoryu12 posted:

How is a permabanned guy posting?

FreudianSlippers posted:

Mummy's curse

Grand Fromage posted: